S Korea scrambles 80 stealth jets

GBNEWS24DESK//

South Korea’s military yesterday scrambled stealth jets after detecting the mobilisation of 180 North Korean warplanes, Seoul said, following a record-breaking blitz of missile tests by Pyongyang this week.

It comes a day after North Korea conducted a failed intercontinental ballistic missile test and follows a decision by Seoul and Washington to extend through today their largest-ever joint air drills, a military exercise that has infuriated Pyongyang.

“Our military detected around 180 North Korean warplanes” mobilised in Pyongyang’s airspace, Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said, adding that Seoul “scrambled 80 fighter jets including F-35As” while jets involved in the joint drills were also “maintaining readiness”.

Shortly after South Korea announced the decision to extend the joint drills on Thursday, Pyongyang launched three more short-range ballistic missiles, calling the decision “a very dangerous and wrong choice”.

Hours later, the North fired 80 artillery rounds that landed in a maritime “buffer zone”, Seoul’s military said.

The barrage was a “clear violation” of the 2018 agreement that established the buffer zone in a bid to reduce tensions between the two sides, Seoul’s Joints Chiefs of Staff said.